Untethered
by AutumnsFey
Summary: What if the locket hadn't been swapped? What if Harry was a lot more sensitive to magic? What if he had taken his relative words harder? This. Warning: Slightly depressive tone.


"_**No one will ever love a freak like you."**_

Those damnable words, spoken so often, with such sincere conviction, coated in loathing and hate, rehearsed by someone who should have cared and been there for him, who should have protected and loved him, were impossible to overcome; he had tried, so many times. Between little flicks of happiness and a seemingly eternity of pain, it was sadly pain that won, leaving the greater impact, the crueller scars, a haunting shadow that summoned itself so much easier than love did. Therefore, it was no wonder that their heart-stabbing vitriol, cutting sharper than any knife could have bit into skin, had clawed itself so deeply within his vulnerable mind that even beneath a few years of experiencing positive emotions, it stayed, coiling around his fragile heart like a snake, constricting and suffocating. Always there. Always threatening. Devouring. Destroying. Damning. Whenever he felt the slightest beginning of hope, those painful memories echoed within him, resonating, and tainting the happiness trying to lighten his heavy heart.

It didn't even seem like a decision, more like a reflex to simply go with that which you knew instead of trusting blindly into the unknown. That which he was familiar with hurt, yes, but at least he knew what to expect, and a hurt he knew was better than the horror that could await him at end of an unfamiliar path.

And how sad was it, that for him, for the little boy he had once been, for the stumbling teenager he was now, that actually meant allowing the self-hate he had been taught to fester like the poison it was.

He had once tried to take the longer, the more difficult road. He tried to take a chance at the impossible, to trust someone else and the feelings they conveyed and inspired – only to be burned so thoroughly, it was nearly hilarious in its terrifying efficiency.

No, his aunt had only spoken the truth. There was no use in dwelling on unreasonable dreams and desires when the unshakeable facts of reality had been driven home day for day for years.

Harry James Potter was unlovable, but he wasn't a fool.

He knew when to accept his fate.

**It didn't come as much of a shock, when he figured out the true reasons behind Dumbledore's lessons at the end of the school year.**

Actually, there was no shock at all.

Maybe there should have been. No. Not maybe. There certainly should have been shock. Harry was quiet sure that he should have been terrified, screaming and scrabbling in denial, but all he actually felt was an overwhelming emptiness as he watched the chalk-white mutilated Inferi slowly crawl out of the dark sea, their undead bodies pale and frozen. He watched numbly as they slowly trod forwards, and not even the moaning of Dumbledore beside him could shake him out of that strange dissociated state he found himself in. The moment he had touched the locket, he had felt something click within him, something so terrifyingly familiar, it took his breath away. It was the same feeling he had experienced in second year, holding Riddles Diary, and know, after suffering from the visions Voldemort kept sending his way, he could definitely identify it.

It was Voldemort's magic.

And after his lessons with Dumbledore, lesson's that in hindsight made a nauseatingly kind of sense, he knew that there was only one reason it would click so deeply within him.

Voldemort's magic was in him – in his soul. Not just remains, as the headmaster had once told him, oh so misleading, making him believe that some of the dark wizards powers had transferred - no, it was the same kind of magic that empowered the locket.

Soul magic. Death magic.

Harry could taste it.

… this explained so much. So so much.

Every horrible truth he had uncovered this year, which weighed on his soul, suddenly made sense. Harry nearly sobbed, in despair and relief. At least one answer, in this prescribed drama he was forced to call his life, at least one thing now made sense.

This answered the question as to why Ron and Hermione had betrayed him. Why they spied on him for the headmaster, and had even planned out his death. It explained why Dumbledore seemed so convinced that Harry himself would die against Voldemort, and why he was necessary to destroy the dark lord. The prophecy had always appeared so fucking self-fulfilling, and now he knew why.

A horcrux could only be destroyed by a handful of things; one of those was its creator's hand.

And Harry, despite being alive, had to be a horcrux.

There was no other explanation.

It all made sense, such an ironically cruel sense.

He closed his eyes.

Maybe he could have had a chance … no.

Who was he trying to kid?

Even those precious few that mattered the most to him were intend on him dying for their cause …

So why try to fight a battle he could only lose?

What did it matter, dying now or dying later?

One way or another ...

He would still die.

**A small, beaten-down, chained-up part of his heart was yearning for one reason to remain,** for just one person to genuinely care for him, care if he lived or died, and so it searched through memories, so few cherished memories …

… and yet, though he dived deeper and deeper, it only got weaker and weaker …

… until it capitulated.

Why fight?

No one cared.

_**Vernon.**_ Hatefully afraid.

_Petunia_. Cruelly jealous.

_Dudley._ Ignorant bully.

_Mrs. Figg._ Dumbledore's watchdog.

_Hagrid. _Dumbledore's man.

_Ron. _Jealous git.

_Hermione. _Selfish bint.

_His classmates. _Sheep.

_His teachers._ Bigger sheep.

_Dumbledore. _Manipulative asshole.

_Remus. _Coward.

The only ones who had ever cared for him, not for his name, fame or destiny, who loved him with all their heart, were dead.

_Dad. Mom. Sirius._

They died for him.

They died _because_ of him.

**So …**

… what would it matter, if he died at Voldemort's hand or through the hands of the man's undead creations?

To him?

It didn't.

Because no matter how, it would be over.

And he would be able to see his family again.

**Harry couldn't help but relax as he slumped to the ground,** his trembling legs refusing to carry him. It was such a strange feeling, relief and fear were coursing through his veins and he fought against neither as those cold dripping hands neared. He didn't look away.

There were better ends.

But there were worse ends, too.

And …

He saw out of the corner of his eye just beside him, distantly taking in the moaning heap that was his headmaster, paralyzed by the potion the old fool had insisted to drink; unaware of the deadly danger they were in.

… there was a little glimmer of vicious glee, knowing that the man who had an even greater hand than Voldemort in destroying his life, in manipulating those Harry loved into their deaths and despair, would share the same fate.

Neither of them would leave this cave alive.

Harry closed his eyes and smiled, the locket secure in his fist.

There were better and worst ways to go.

At least, it would stop.

This cruel game known as life.

This mockery he endured.

At last … _peace._

" _**Not like this."**_

_~End Part I. TBC in Part II.~_


End file.
